A stranger took the seat I’d paid extra for, laughed at me holding my six-week-old, and told a flight attendant she refused to move. They put me three rows behind my ten-year-old.

The cabin did not make a sound.

“A passenger in Row 11 was moved from a seat she paid for. That should not have occurred. The individual occupying that seat is a company employee traveling on standby privileges, which do not permit her to occupy a revenue seat. My colleague was given incomplete information at the door and acted on it. I’d like to apologize on behalf of this crew to the mother in Row 14, to her daughter in 11B, and to all of you who watched it and had no way of knowing what you were looking at.”

She paused.

“The ten-year-old in 11B knew. She’d read the policy. I’ve been flying twenty-six years and I did not expect to be corrected by a passenger in the fourth grade, and I’d like the record to show that she was right and we were wrong.”

And then a hundred and forty people did the thing you’re not supposed to do at thirty thousand feet.